Finding a New Focus
The school system in Viet Nam is not like the one in the United States. Without taxes, even the youngest students must pay tuition. Few families can afford it. Children either go uneducated or find means to survive in the streets to help their families make ends meet. Not all teachers make little girls kneel in the corner though. Many rural teachers are very dedicated—working for free to help children and families overcome poverty through education.

“Education became the shining beacon for me,” says Tinh. “I felt that by ensuring education for the children of Viet Nam, we could assist in eliminating the cycle of hunger, illiteracy, prostitution, and hopelessness—instead allowing children to dream, to hope and through that, to create a better world.”

The experience was also a way to help Tinh deal with the pain and emotions he had been struggling with for so long.

“I felt like this was the release I needed—compassion and service to these children was the way to release my feelings—in effect, to leave the frustrations of those feelings behind, while using the love behind those frustrations to try to change the situation for these children.”

Fulfilling a Mission
Upon returning to the United States, Tnh, together with several friends, started the Village School Foundation to help provide a future for the children in Viet Nam. In the past four years, the foundation has successfully built three schools in the rural villages outside of Phan Thiet, the coastal town one hundred and twenty miles northeast of Saigon, where Tinh spent his early childhood. A fourth school is slated to open to a new group of students later this fall.

The children of Phan Thiet and the nearby villages inspire hope, and at and the same time, make us pause at the purity and simplicity of their dreams. They want to learn. More than anything, they want to learn, go to school, support their families, pursue their dreams. This dream is echoed in every child Tinh and other VSF volunteers meet on the streets of Phan Thiet—children, eight, nine, 10 years old, selling lottery tickets on the streets until two in the morning to make a few dollars to support their families.

Tinh shakes his head when he recalls these children living on the streets—he can’t hide the disbelief on his face anymore than he can fool us with the subtle smile that comes to his face.

“Despite everything, despite their poverty, despite living on the streets, these kids live each day with hope. You walk up and talk to them and ask them about their dreams, ask them about what they want. Unlike American kids, it’s not a Gameboy, it’s not a car or a new pair of skis. What they want is an education. Something so simple. Something so many of us here take for granted,” said Tinh.

“In a world torn by war, by poverty, by hatred, these children are everyone’s children,” says Tinh. “They are your children and they are my children. Even though we don’t raise them as our own; even though they don’t live in our homes; they depend on us and we will someday depend on them. Please join the Village School Foundation in their mission to bring the hopes and dreams of these children into reality. The reward is priceless.”

To support the Village School Foundation with a donation, or for more information, visit the Foundation’s website at www.vsfoundation.com.

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Dan Enbysk, a Portland, Oregon resident, is Director of Programs for the Village School Foundation. Comments can be sent to dan@vsfoundation.com.

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